The pressure of an increasingly demanding work culture in the UK is perhaps the biggest and most pressing challenge to the mental health of the general population. The cumulative effect of increased working hours is having an important effect on the lifestyle of a huge number of people, which is likely to prove damaging to their mental well-being. The Mental Health Foundation is concerned that a sizeable group of people are neglecting the factors in their lives which make them resistant or resilient to mental health problems.
It is estimated that nearly three in every ten employees will experience a mental health problem in any one year. However the recent and dramatic rise in Britain’s working hours would suggest this is likely to increase. In 2000 a Department for Education and Employment survey revealed that around one in eight employees was working more than 60 hours a week. That same year the Prime Minister launched the Work Life Balance campaign. Over the subsequent two years the number of people working more than 60 hours rose to one in six. The number of women working these hours more than doubled over the same period.
It is also estimated that stress related sick leave costs British industry £370 million every year or approximately 91 million working days. This is half of all days lost.
Back to the top
The Mental Health Foundation mounted a survey to highlight this area of concern. A total of 577 respondents completed a questionnaire which sought information on the amount of time they devote to work, their reasons for it, their feelings about it and the impact it has on other aspects of their life. The key findings from this survey are outlined below.
- One third of respondents feel unhappy or very unhappy about the time they devote to work.
- More than 40% of employees are neglecting other aspects of their life because of work, which may increase their vulnerability to mental health problems
- When working long hours more than a quarter of employees feel depressed (27%), one third feel anxious (34%), and more than half feel irritable (58%).
- The more hours you spend at work, the more hours outside of work you are likely to spend thinking or worrying about it.
- As a person’s weekly hours increase, so do their feelings of unhappiness.
- Many more women report unhappiness than men (42% of women compared with 29% of men), which is probably a consequence of competing life roles and more pressure to ‘juggle’.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
